Tag Archives: accountability

It’s been a long time since I wrote anything here. Sometimes it feels like it’s been a long time since I wrote. It’s not true… I’ve managed some writing regularly. Not as much as I feel I should be doing, and definitely not enough to feel the release writing used to bring to me when life was a bit less crazy.

Things have been a little off-kilter these days. We’re in the midst of a move, preparing for a trip to the UK (was already half in the works well before all this location change stuff happened), the home repairs and renovations we’d intended on finishing through “Weekend Warrior-ing” are now being done at whirlwind speeds….

I haven’t had a lot of mental energy left for posting to my blogs. Or rather to this blog. I have managed pretty well at keeping the ROW80 blog on track. Mostly… I dropped the ball this week, twice.

So, to get myself back into a bit of a schedule, I’m resuming my ROW80 journey. Simple goals…

Two things today… a WIPpet and at the end of this post, a brief ROW80 End of Round update.

Today’s WIPpet follows on the heels of the piece I posted two weeks ago from my The Odds fanfic. The first line today is the last line from last week. Andy and Kieri are getting a new perspective on each other.

This snippet is a bit longer than most of the ones I post. I hope you’ll bear with me as it closes at a good spot (imho, of course). There are ten (mostly small) paragraphs. There’s one 2 in the 12 for December; divide the day (20) by that 2 and you have ten…

“Did you cry when I was shot?”

His lover stopped, still turned away. Though Kieri didn’t answer for several breaths, thankfully he finally did before Andy felt inspired to head over and hound him. “Of course.”

Kieri still didn’t turn to face him, but Andy didn’t feel like a little kid chasing an idol now as he walked around look at him. The other man’s lips pursed in something close to a snarl. He practically spat as he continued. “I was damned banshee for weeks after.” Now Kieri looked at him. It was a look that made Andy’s blood freeze. “As lost as the day I’d lost Pem, maybe more… I don’t know. I didn’t feel like killing myself—I didn’t feel, if you have to know. I stopped feeling. Stopped caring. None of it seemed to matter. I stayed in our room until Vern had the rest of the guys drag us out of there so he could bury you, the second week after it had happened.”

Andy grimaced. “Two weeks? Not that I don’t—ugh, that’s just wrong.”

“Yeah, maybe. But I didn’t care. It was my fault you’d died, and I..I just wanted you back, maybe I thought I could trade places with you. I don’t know.”

He nodded, though like the story of the Andar’s wife, he really didn’t understand. To do such a thing and yet not be able to share his feelings… Even now the man was evading him. Though maybe the barriers were down enough. “Why? I don’t see how it would have helped.”

As close as they’d been, sex, passion, great talks, all the closeness and ideas they’d shared, he’d never seen Kieri shed a tear or show tenderness in any way for him.

Now he was seeing it; it shook him. It had taken his death to do this. Andy had always hoped to crack Kieri’s shell with who he was, not with what they’d suffered. He couldn’t love a rock.

Still, the words came, unwanted now. “That didn’t matter though. I loved you—you’d been everything to me, and I’d been too stupid to understand that until it was too late.”

Andy wasn’t sure what to say. It nothing like he’d hoped, and he needed to understand why. He looked at the floor, tracing the lines of the pattern in the tiles with his gaze. “We should get going.”

Thank the god, goddess, whatever… Thank Whatever that the other man just agreed.

Hope you enjoyed that piece. If you’d like more head over to our special WIPpet linky and visit our other awesome members. Thank you, Emily Wrayburn, for being such a gracious host.

A little ROw80 update

Today, for those of you who participate in the A Round of Words in 80 Days writing challenge, is the last day of Round 4. It’s the last day of the year in ROW80 terms as well.

I’d like to say I ended the year on a high note. True, I don’t feel this was my most productive year as a writer—instead it became a year for different discoveries and developing new skills. The biggest would be learning how to understand the patterns both in my writing but also that in others’ writings. And to recognize where some of my limits actually lie and devising strategies to work around them instead of trying to press through difficulties, failing and then bashing myself against those walls in frustration.

I’ve also learned how to better handle time constraints, and how to make the best of inspirational sparks when they arrive. It’s been a year of reading, as I’ve rediscovered a love for books that had faded for a time after some particularly wall-worthy texts had landed in my hands.

It’s that time again… Words, whimsy (well, maybe some whimsy) and another ROW80 check-in.

The check-in is the easy part. I’ve been… flumpy. Mostly I’ve tried to finish off a stack of library books that I’d foolishly taken out (well, actually I’d ordered them through the intra-library loan months before and they’d all managed to arrive at the end of October… and if I hadn’t signed them out, I’d have had to repeat the request process all over again). I feel I should be writing, but I also feel I need to finish these books. I feel… unfocused and haven’t been able to concentrate on my “work writing”. I’ve still got some time to work on my proposal for the Golden Heart awards, but lately, I feel like I’m slogging through Flag Fen or someplace similar. Most any progress I’ve made in my J&tWW fanfic The Odds.

I managed some serious words there. Which leads to the…

WIPpet

I have nine paragraphs today… a bit longer than I’d planned but when I looked at the snippet, things pretty much fell together. This piece from The Odds (I posted from this fanfic last week, dealing with Atyr and Alanii), involving Kieri and Andy’s reunion. This piece is pretty raw (edited mostly for spelling and really obvious errors but not much else).

Maths: December (12 →1+2) plus 6 equals 9

Kieri looked at something on his arm guard “S__t.” He reached into a pocket. “Here. Nights can get a bit rough in the Laris.” The man passed him a small phase pistol with a sheath and an extra cap of charges.

Andy accepted it without question. Rough was one thing they both knew, and it didn’t look like Kieri had forgotten any of those lessons these past six years.

As he was busy threading the thin waist sash he’d been given by the Andar through the sheath, Andy felt a tenuous touch on his shoulder. He looked up, to meet Kieri’s green-eyed gaze, looking down at him.

Kieri was crying.

Andy asked “what’s wrong?” even though he knew what it had to be.

The other man raised a finger, allowing himself to track it along Andy’s cheek. The tip trembled then paused just before his chin. In a whisper that was no steadier than his hand, Kieri said, “It’s really you. It’s you. The Bright Knows, I wished for this, prayed for this. Just to see you again. To see you—have a chance to tell you…”

Like so many times before Andy felt his breath catch; his blood ignited at the man’s touch. He reached and clutched his lover’s hand to his skin. He stared at that careworn face, admiring every line it held. “Tell me what, lover?” he breathed.

Then, like so many times before, the man stopped short. His expression hardened. He withdrew. “I’m glad you’re back. I missed you.”

Andy felt his breath leave him, worse than if the man had punched him. How he hated when he…when he did that. For a moment he just stared at Kieri—f__n Brat hadn’t changed much after all—and fumed. No, Andy decided. He wasn’t going to leave it alone this time. He’d been dead. Six years he’d been dead, and something had made the Andar and his wife to bring him back. Andy stiffened his lip, then before Kieri could head to the door he asked, “Did you cry when I was shot?”

Hope you enjoyed that. If you’d like to see more, head over to the WIPpet linky and visit some our other awesome members. Emily Wrayburn, our gracious host, helps keep us in line (usually), and it’s thanks to her that we’re here.